As support for Prop 30 wanes at around 50% a new report from CBS Reporter David Goldstein indicates that tax payers are paying for Cal Trans employees using state cars as their own personal vehicles. David confronted Brown on this fact, grabbing his phone out of his hands and calling him a “thug”.
Goldstein shows Cal Trans employees using state cars as their own personal vehicles hitting Costco and Nordstrom on the taxpayers’ dime.
Of course this is far from the only example of tax dollars being used for personal expenses of state employees. There is also this story of money intended for the construction of a Los Angeles affordable-housing project diverted to pay for a high-end renovation to a Glendale city councilman’s condominium, according to a subcontractor who worked on both jobs.
It’s hard to rationalize giving Sacramento more money as these stories contine to emerge indicating the state has a serious problem ensuring the money isn’t stolen by state employees.
It certainly doesn’t help that the state cut funding to enforce the Brown Act that would keep politicians from meeting with special interests in secret (BTW Brown Act funding is permanently cut in the language of the tax hike measure).